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Comment by antiquark | Hacker News Reader

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That cuts both ways - can people in the US vote for democratic socialism, or will the capitalists then create super PACs to influence elections, thus undermining the principle of one person, one vote?

So the socialists don't influence elections? they don't have speeches and advertising? News to me -- are you sure the majority want socialism? seems like many many people don't. Or is the election only "influenced" if it doesn't go your way?

I have no horse in that race as I don't live in the US. But reading today that in Michigan the democratic primary loser outspent the winner almost 10:1 truly baffled my mind. Stuff like this isn't even legal in most other democracies, i.e. in France all presidential candidates have to have equal TV time to present their respective positions.

Imagine how the political landscape in the US would look like if people's votes were actually equal.

So the primary should have gone to the person who spent more? maybe infinite spending can't force through an unpopular platform?

I think you've misinterpreted the parent.

Someone almost bought that election. That it didn't quite work doesn't make it a good scenario.

This is nonsensical.

This PAC influence being putatively for buying advertising, to you know influence individual voters to their point of view? They can’t literally buy votes.

So votes only matter if they’re not influenced by PACs? Perhaps it’s more that if a voter agrees with a capitalist PAC then it’s no longer a valid individual vote? It smacks of anti-democratic value that the masses are too dumb to vote correctly.

Of course they don't literally buy votes, but statistically they very much do. Stuff like not having votes only on sundays, votes taking hours, publicity just meaning outspending the opponent etc. are all things most other democracies don't have. I literally had a political science course in university were these were taught as cases of voter suppression (i.e. If you are a member of the working /middle /upper class, how likely is it that you can easily be off work for a full day on a tuesday, compared to a sunday?).

> Of course they don't literally buy votes, but statistically they very much do.

Counterpoint: Haley Stevens Brad Daigle Jon Tester Sherrod Brown Tom Steyer Hillary Clinton Michael Bloomberg (the list is long)

You need "some amount of money" to compete in elections, but the "money correlates to votes" is canard.

Most democratic socialist societies are capitalist, capitalism just remains politically subordinate rather than able to govern society unchecked.

Those would be social democracies.

No, social democracies are subservient to capital.

The whole modern democratic socialist movement as I understand it is primarily to fix exactly that issue.

I don't have much to discuss about the movement (although I am sceptical due to the repeated historical pattern of Mensheviks making way for Bolsheviks), but the subject we are discussing are democratic socialist countries, not movements, which as far as I am aware, don't exist. There are social democracies like Finland, which is what I assume the poster was referring to.

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